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The Rudolf Steiner Archive

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Search results 1851 through 1860 of 6073

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32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: Two National Poets of Austria 31 Mar 1890,

Rudolf Steiner
He devoted himself to scientific and philosophical studies in Vienna under the greatest privations. His great talent was recognized by insightful people at the very moment when Fercher was on the verge of perishing in the material hardships of life.
Fercher certainly still has treasures in his writing desk; but he can hope for no understanding in the neglect of our literary conditions; and therefore he would probably prefer not to publish.
In "Saul" we meet a personality in the midst of the Jewish people who wants to preach the God of love to this people. But the people of Jehovah have no understanding for this. Therein lies the tragedy of Saul. Full understanding for the religion of love could only be had by a people who live completely egoistically according to the ideal.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: Faust Explained

Rudolf Steiner
Medicinae, who put the Holy Scriptures behind the door and under the bench". This means nothing other than: Faust has left the paths of thought marked out by higher powers and, as a truly free man, wants to determine his own goal and direction.
In doing so, he has probably done more for our understanding of Faust than can ever be done by proving when this or that scene was first written down. We will only emphasize a few things.
It is precisely here that one would most likely believe that Goethe started from an abstract idea, and it is interesting to see how a concrete image underlies this as well. Goethe's Faust requires commentary. The natural freshness of the first part and the high culture of the second, which make the poetry so appealing to us, also present difficulties of a very special kind for understanding.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: Homunculus

Rudolf Steiner
Richter, Hamburg and Leipzig 1888 Hamerling's peculiarity lies in the happy combination of a rich imagination with a profound understanding of things. As a result, he seems to be the most competent poetic portrayer of those historical epochs in which the turning points of human development occurred.
In it all the perversities of it appear carried to extremes and thus in their inner hollowness. He undertakes everything possible. However, he never strives to create anything truly positive, but only to use the products of nature and the human spirit for his own entirely futile undertakings in order to gain honor, prestige and power.
This empire also suffers from the same flaw as all other undertakings of the homunculus. The ape has become outwardly human, it even lives in the forms of the state, but again the soul is missing.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: Goethe's Iphigenia 26 Sep 1891,

Rudolf Steiner
Heinzelmann Erfurt 1891, Hugo Neumann The attempt to measure Goethe according to an underlying standard must always lead to erroneous results. Just as little positive contribution to Goethe's scientific knowledge will be made by those who simply ask themselves: to what extent do Goethe's scientific views agree with those of Darwinism or those of our time in general, just as little can a person come to a correct judgment about the ethical and religious content of Goethe's poems who examines them for their agreement or disagreement with the teachings of Christianity, as the author of this lecture does.
And if he recommends the interpretation of "Iphigenia" for school use in his sense, we would like to say, on the other hand, that for this purpose the pure, unbiased consideration of the work of art seems more useful to us, because it alone brings the student to understand Goethe purely from within, without any preconceived opinion.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: Serious Sign of the Times 23 Jan 1892,

Rudolf Steiner
It must be particularly painful that this case could occur in the field of art. It shows a lack of understanding of the inner essence and dignity of art. In times when art was a pastime to fill idle hours, when people had no idea of its high value, the opinion that any gentleman could take the helm of an art institution could have been justified.
We have no doubt that future literary historians will celebrate Bulthaupt as a great dramatist who was wronged by his contemporaries. But why do people who claim to understand such things not step forward when a position needs to be filled and say with energy: this is the most worthy man for this place?
But that can mean nothing compared to the fact that there are men in Germany who have proven through their journalistic achievements that every theater can expect an artistic upswing under their direction. Where that is the case, there is no need to let someone settle in first. It is painful to see so much intellectual power that is not used in public life, while important things are accomplished by people who appear to have little vocation.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: Max Stirner and Friedrich Nietzsche

Rudolf Steiner
For Schellwien, the real task of philosophy is to understand the latter as a birth from the unconscious, which comes about through the "I". For Schellwien, the laws that constitute the world are only the laws of our own "I", which confront us as an object.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: A New Book on Goethe's Faust 19 Aug 1893,

Rudolf Steiner
You only need to know a part of this literature to know that some of the difficulties that are supposed to stand in the way of understanding the poem have been artificially created by aesthetes, philosophers and philologists, that some of the riddles that one believes to find in the work are not really there, but only imagined.
One need not be an enemy of this approach to realize that it can easily deprive us of the enjoyment and understanding of a work as an artistic whole. This understanding is not achieved by dissecting scholarship, but by the recreative imagination of the connoisseur and viewer, who is able to grasp the artistic unity of a work and to judge and feel the relationship of the parts to this unity.
He refers to Goethe himself, who claims to have understood his work in this way. In "Vorspiel auf dem Theater", Goethe allows the various moods that confront a work of art to find expression.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: Marie Eugenie delle Grazie 21 Mar 1894,

Rudolf Steiner
Only those who are blind to the spirit of our time, or only understand its pose, can fail to recognize the significance of this poetry. There is nothing petty in the painful tones struck here.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: The Girl from Oberkirch 12 Jan 1896,

Rudolf Steiner
The baron explains that he had already wanted to make the girl his "under certain conditions" in the "times of prosperous happiness". Now he is relying primarily on the advantage that a union with one of the noblest daughters of the people would bring him and his family.
Goethe no longer deals with the manifestations of the revolutionary movement in a region outside the place of origin of the revolution; he seeks out the social currents underlying the great upheaval in Paris itself. Goethe began work on the "Natural Daughter" in December 1799.
32. Collected Essays on Literature 1884-1902: A Viennese Poet

Rudolf Steiner
As if sounds had risen from the depths of the soul that had never been heard before. I could not quite understand the jubilation. I have often felt this way in recent years when I have heard that a mighty genius has arisen here or there.
"But he is not the naïve poet who cannot say mean things because under his gaze they are always immediately transformed into noble things. No, our Peter has often seen the common.
When it finally awakens, he cries out so blissfully, as if all mesquine things were suddenly transfigured under the ray of his goodness, and in their transfiguration he must always remember with wonder how poor they were just a moment ago.

Results 1851 through 1860 of 6073

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